The Department of Agriculture is giving meat, agriculture and fisheries importers until the end of this year to have their SPS clearances revalidated, otherwise the agency would consider them cancelled.

About 7,000 SPS clearances of the more than 19,000 issued by the DA in the past administration remain unvalidated, according to Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol in his year-end presser.

In line with its efforts to weed out unscrupulous traders from legitimate importers, Pinol said the agency has already processed 12,000 SPS permits since the drive to minimize technical smuggling of agricultural products took effect November 22.

“We now have a clearer picture of the situation,” Piñol said.

“Because of this campaign, we were able to weed out the fake clearances used by unscrupulous importers,” he said.

The technical working group Pinol created to handle the review and validation of said permits was blinded and overwhelmed by the volume of SPS previously issued, according to the Secretary.

 “There are used and recycled SPS as well as fake clearances,” Piñol said.

 There were also reports, Pinol said, that some importers were able to bring out shipment without validation.

Undersecretary for Operations Ariel T. Cayanan said the agency is now “databasing” blacklisted companies following the SPS validation.

“We have to do this to protect the interest of the general public.” (DA-OSEC)

Reference:
USec. Ariel Cayanan